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Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2015 Update 1 (code-named Carina) brings a lot of great new functionalities, in this post the full redesign of the CRM for Phone application is presented.

CRM for Phone was redesigned to provide more functionality and a more similar experience to the other UI endpoints (e.g.: Web; CRM for Tablets, etc.).

In a nutshell, CRM for Phone has now the same functionality as CRM for Tablet.

As per Microsoft’s remarks: “the implementation is the same but the experience is optimised for the Phone”. Even though not mentioned specifically, I would put my money on it being a “Universal Application” (CRM for XBox next?).

This new app., and will only work for 2015 Update 1 (AKA: v7.1) and beyond.

The sections below detail into the new UI look and feel and on the major new functionalities now available for phones.

Through the Screens

The sections below show, screen by screen, the new UI design.

Home Screen

Navigation Menu

Record Form

Business Process Flow

The image below shows how the steps in a specific stage are presented, now in everything similar to the CRM for Tablet UI.

Dashboard View

Pint to Start and Pin to Home

A record can be pinned to the home page of the application, as per below:

Similarly, the item can also be pinned to the start screen of the device. In Windows 8 it means the start screen (new UI of Windows 8) but on tablets and phones means a direct link to the item from the start screen of the device.

A Dashboard

Dashboards are now available also, and the user can switch between dashboards and/or drill down from charts and views.

View

Tile Resizing

Items (records, dashboards, views, etc.) pinned to the home screen of the application can also be resized. Bigger tiles allow for more information/functionality to be available, as per example below.

Before resize

After resize

OS’s Supported

The table below presents the OS versions and the minimum RAM resources required to run the new CRM for Phones application.

Platform

Versions

RAM

iOS

7.x and 8.x

=>1GB

Android

4.4

=>1GB

Windows Phone

8.1 GDR

=>512MB

Two versions: “CRM for Phone – Express” and “CRM for Phone”.

The previous version of the phone app. will continue to exist all still work on Update 1 but:

It will now be renamed to “CRM for Phone – Express”.

Will continue to work with 2015 Update 1 Online (to be confirmed if the on premises will also support it).

Users will be notified when accessing through it to a 7.1 server that there is a new, more modern, app (details in table below).

The new version will be known in the app. stores as “CRM for Phone”.

Details on supportability can be found in the table below:

Server Version

CRM for Phone – Express

CRM for Phone

v6.x / v7.0

Supported

Not Supported

v7.1 – Online only

Deprecated

Supported

> v7.1

Not Supported

Supported

Unsupported Entities

The new “CRM for Phone” app. will not initially support some entities that “CRM for Phone – Express” does, as per table below:

#

Entity Name

1

Address

2

Campaign

3

Campaign Activity

4

Campaign Response

5

Contract

6

Contract Detail

7

Discount

8

Discount List

9

Facility/Equipment

10

Fax

11

Invoice Product

12

Invoices

13

Letters

14

Mailbox

15

Marketing List

16

Opportunity Close

17

Order

18

Order Product

19

Price List

20

price List Item

21

Quote Close

22

Quote Product

23

Quotes

24

Service

25

Service Activities

26

Subject

27

Territory

28

Unit

29

Unit Group

Key Takeaways

Record forms redesigned to be aligned with CRM for tablets UI.

The main form is now the one considered to render the records form.

Pin to start screen

Pin to home screen.

Business Rules and JavaScript are now supported.

Business Process Flows are now available and aligned with CRM for tablets UI.

Custom entities are fully supported now.

Offline mode functionality (including creating draft records).

Quick create forms will now be available.

Open phones default map application by clicking the address field (this is a new functionality that will also be introduced to CRM for Tablets app.)

Not all entities available in the older version will be available in the new one.

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Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2015 Update 1 (code-named Carina) brings a lot of great new functionalities, in this post the new folder tracking functionality is presented.

Why use folders?

For a couple of reasons, namely:

Leveraging existing OOB functionality on e-mail clients:

Most web, desktop and mobile e-mail clients support folders natively.

Most clients also support setting automated rules (e.g.: when an e-mail comes from a particular address or with a particular subject move it to a specific folder.

No additional add-ons required for the e-mail client.

Faster performance: In the end of the day CRM Outlook client still impacts on Outlook performance.

This new feature is very specific to tracking e-mails, the reason they were tackled first is not only because folder tracking is an “easy” implementation that leverages on existing e-mail clients capabilities as it was also the main record of concern when tracking data to CRM, as per image below:

Additionally, there is a considerable amount of CRM users that use standard web of mobile e-mail clients that are not aware of MSCRM, most, if not all, supporting folders and rule definition/automations:

How to setup?

In e-mail Client: Create the folder(s) against which you which to track.

In CRM: Create a rule in CRM to map each folder to a specific CRM Record (as per image below).

Exchange folders are updated to CRM on every server-side-sync.

Up to 25 rules can be created per user.

And that’s it, it’s done!

How to use it?

Just move the e-mail you wish to track into the appropriate folder.

The actual actions/steps required to move an e-mail to a folder depend on the e-mail client used. Below are some examples:

Outlook: Just drag the e-mail to the folder.

IOS mail app: From the e-mail message, click the folder button, then chose folder to move it to.

Requirements

For folder tracking to work, all of the bellow need to be true:

Server-side sync required: The user either has CRM Outlook setup or the new folder tracking feature (more details in “Should I still use CRM Outlook Client?” section).

Exchange server required

Folders under Inbox required

Folder mapping set up: As per “How to Setup?” section above.

Tips & Tricks

You can have multiple folders regarding the same CRM record

Create a folder for long-lasting record types: To set regarding directly against them when moving the e-mail to the folder (e.g.: Cases, Opportunities, etc.).

SDK support to manage the rules: In cause automations are required to auto configure rules in CRM.

Use sub folder tricks for personal emails: Sub folders are not part of the rule for parent folders.

If regarding not specified, you can set it later: You can always go to CRM and set it.

Use it on your phone, OWA, Outlook, etc.

Learn more on how to set up Exchange rules: They can be leveraged to automate most of the tracking.

If you remove the rule, all emails in the folder will not be impacted: They have already moved /where already tracked in CRM.

In CRM, the folder list in Rule UI is updated periodically: When the mailbox is processed by server-side sync.

Clean up mappings when no longer needed: The max is 25 rules per Mailbox / User.

Should I still use CRM Outlook Client?

Yes, as per table below, CRM Outlook Client still has a lot of functionality/value that is not going to be replaced any time soon.

Feature

Server Side Sync

(w/ Folder Tracking)

CRM Outlook Client

Track E-mails to CRM

ü

ü

Track other records to CRM

(e.g.: contacts; appointments; tasks)

û

ü

Send records to Outlook

(e.g.: appointments, contacts, and tasks)

ü

ü

Open CRM Records

(e.g.: open related case record from an e-mail)

û

ü

Maintain Data Offline

û

ü

With the server-side-sync, and the new folder tracking functionality, CRM is allowing for another utilization scenario, where the user’s e-mail client is agnostic to MSCRM and thus covering a more complete set of endpoints that can now be used to interact with MSCRM.

Note: Do note set CRM Outlook Client and server-side-sync simultaneously for the same user. Microsoft does not recommend it (source), and chances are a lot of issues may occur.

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Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2015 Update 1 (code-named Carina), available for CRM Online only, brings a lot of great new functionalities, in this post the full redesign of the export functionality is presented.

This redesign is mostly due to issues the previous implementation had. Overall some of these issues have been in Microsoft Connect feedback site (more on this site on a later post, ;)) for around 3 years now and in the top #10 of the requested features/fixes of all time.

What was wrong and how was it fixed?

So many things were fixed, but I believe the best is to explain in a table, as per below:

#

Issue

Fix/Redesign Applied

1

If exported as a static worksheet, the excel file could not be used for re-import to bulk update records. This was because the export did not contain the records GUIDs, and also the format extracted was .xls which was not a supported format for import.

Now the export always brings the GUIDs, and the user can bulk edit and re-import if required.

2

The export for re-import file format was XML (spreadsheet 2003). This was not only pretty locked down (e.g.: no access to sheets area) as it was also buggy (e.g. ever tried to select a column to resize it? Excel crashed always).

Now the format is .xlsx, and pretty much a regular excel file, the data comes pre-formatted as an excel table.

3

Formatting…Formatting…Formatting, so many issues here, e.g.:

Numeric Data exported as text.

Leading zeros disappeared.

Field format is now respected:

Text stays as Text.

Number as Number.

Currency in one Column.

Full details on how the mapping fully works can be found in section “Field Types Mapping”.

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Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2015 Update 1 (code named Carina) brings a lot of new great functionalities, in this post the new theming functionality is presented.

Event though not essential when customizing CRM to the customer’s specific needs (traditionally getting they’re business specific processes up and running would the main thing), I lost count on how many times this was requested by customers.

It seems theming plays a key role for customers to feel they have something of their own, rather than just another standard OOB solution.

Setting a new Theme

There is a new “Themes” option available in Settings > Customizations:

Users can set new themes, clone from existing themes and finally publish themes.

Only one theme can be set as default, and AFAIK there it is not possible to define different themes for different users, but the customization options are pretty much aligned to make this a reality, probably it will come out on a “Update 2”.

Previewing: Users can also preview the theme they are setting, as per button in image above:

This will set a cookie that allows the user to use this theme for a set time before it reverts (how long is the “set time”? It seems to be a secret of the gods for now. If anyone knows the answer feel free to share it in the comments area).

Previewing or publishing a new theme resets it. Erasing cookies will erase this as well.

Last, but not least, a theme allows for the following to be configured (more details on each configuration option can be found in the next section):

What Changes can be done to the UI?

Navigation Bar:

Logo

Logo Tooltip

Navigation Bar Colour

Navigation Bar Shelf Colour

Header Colour: This affects main navigation bar as well as view and form navigation bars, as per images below:

And

UI Elements

Global Link Colour: The colour for links, such as email addresses or lookups.

Link: This is not for Global Links, this is the colour that commands or lists will use when you hover over the items.

Selected Link Effect: The colour that commands or lists will use to indicate selected items.

Hover Link Effect: The colour that commands or lists will use when you hover over the items.

Process Control Colour: The primary colour for process controls.

Default Entity Colour: The default colour for system entities if no colour is assigned.

Control Shade: The colour for controls to use to indicate when you hover over items. and

Control Border.

More details can be found here (this link is actually on the theme entity itself (useful if a developer wants to query / further enhance themes with automation, but also provides a god description on what each configuration setting means).

Example Custom Theme

Below are some example images on how a custom theme could look like in CRM 2015 Update 1.

Navigation Level:

Form Level:

Field Level:

Tips, Tricks and Recommendations

Below some tips, tricks and recommendations on themes:

Primarily for Branding:

Logos, Main Navigation.

Adjusting Accent colours only: Hover colours, Selection colours.

Not designed to alter CRM UI drastically: The theming is designed to make colour changes and not to drastically alter the CRM UI.

Core CRM Icons are not exposed to theming this release, and some are legacy (i.e. still are 2011 icons and will continue to use the default colour for hover effects.

Entity Colours (they can also be adjusted):

They are part of Entity Metadata.

Limitations: The same entity must be the same colour even if under different Sitemap nodes (e.g.: Cannot make all Service entities one colour and all Sales entities one colour because they overlap).

Contrast

Beware of colour contrast. The OOB theme has the correct contrast ratios to ensure optimal usability, consider them as a basis for your custom themes.

High contrast mode will always be using the default colour settings.

Don’t over-use colours

Every entity can have a different colour if necessary, but the recommend is using one of 2 patterns:

Make all entities neutral and highlight the key ones.

Make all entities that mean something with similar or same colour. Keep the total number of groups low.

Theming across environments:

There’s are set as records of a new “Theme”, as such it is not possible to bring them across as part of a solution. A traditional post deployment data “sync”/”migration” is advised it this is intended.

As an alternative themes can be exported and re-imported into another environment (details on this can be found in Manage configuration data). Then they must be published to become active.

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Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2015 Update 1 (code named Carina) brings a lot of new great functionalities, in this post the new Immersive Excel functionality is presented.

Immersive Ad-hoc Analysis

Two areas to take into consideration for the Ad-hoc Analysis:

Embedded experience in CRM: CRM views can now be viewed as excel lists from inside CRM as example image below.

Bring in Excel capabilities into CRM: Users can do all the major features expected on excel (e.g.: filters, pivot tables, charts, etc.), as they did before on real-time data, but now without leaving CRM web interface and having to export views as excel files.

Immersive Bulk Edit

The image below perfectly captures how immersive bulk edit works:

In detail:

Views will now present the capability to “Open in Excel Online”.

The view will then be presented to the user as an excel online sheet, imbedded into the CRM UI. This is very similar to SharePoint’s functionality “Quick Edit”, where a user can bulk update a list, where excel like functionality presented to the user.

The user can then make the updates inline and click “SAVE CHANGES TO CRM” to confirm the bulk update.

The action that follows actually recuses the standard functionality, already available on previous versions of CRM (dated back to a least CRM 4.0):

The standard functionality by itself allows a user to:

Export data to a excel file, with the “bulk update” option selected.

This will export the excel file with hidden columns, such as the records GUID.

The user can then update data in the excel and import is back to CRM, by using its Import functionality.

The imported file would go to a “import queue”, where the file would pass through various stages, parsing, transforming and eventually importing (more details on the stages can be found here).

The functionality explained in the bullet above still occurs in “Immersive Bulk Edit” but CRM manages all the process for the user, as follows:

Creates a temporary excel with the data from the view, including the GUID (this excel would have the same format as if it would have been exported for re-import manually).

After user clicks on “SAVE CHANGES TO CRM”, the excel is imported into CRM and presents the user with the option to access the imports view.

This functionality does not replace the existing export for re-import, on CRM Update 1 both will be available, but Immersive Bulk Edit will now provide a faster alternative for bulk updates.

Requirements

Online only, further details:

CRM Online only

Might require the user to have an Office 365 License (TBConfirmed): This functionality leverages the Online versions of Office only

The user Role in CRM has to have the “Export to Excel” privilege set.

Best Practices

At least 6 to take into consideration:

Immersive Excel is purely “On the Fly”: If you need to save the file permanently, copy data to another place or use Export to Excel functionality in CRM instead.

Check file generated time in the UI: Time indicator on the top right, it regenerates the file (per view per user) after 5 minutes.

Navigate away when you no longer need the content: If you need the content, import the data or copy the changes to somewhere else.

Monitor Bulk updates is recommended: Import is asynchronous, and might fail is new data is badly formatted, go to imports section to track progress if required.

Immersive Excel is available purely in Web Client: It will not allow the user to open the excel in desktop mode, the user will have to save/export to local folder.

Always start Immersive Excel from a full CRM view: If Advanced Find is used to get the date to bulk update, save as a view first.

Conclusion

Ad-hoc Analysis and Bulk Edit can be accessed the same way, the same excel will be presented, the difference between them is what the user choses to do once the excel file is open, as follows:

If the user choses to create new sheets with pivot tables, charts etc, as a concept, this is considered to be “Immersive Ad-hoc Analysis”.

If the user choses to update the values of the data being presented and the “SAVE CHANGES TO CRM”, as a concept, this is considered to be “Immersive Bulk Edit”.

Stay tuned, more posts to come on 2015’s Update 1 and its new functionalities.

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